It’s clear that Levine excells in her humorous fractured fairytales and the short stories of The Princess Tales are no exception.

1. The Fairy’s Mistake: Maybe it’s cheating to put the first book as umber one but it’s such a fun introduction to the series and features one of my favorite obscure tales-Diamonds and Toads, and how the curse/blessing turns out to be quite the reverse.
2. For Biddle’s Sake: This one’s based on a German fairytale called Puddocky which seems to be a combination of Rapunzel/The Frog Prince only the frog girl can do magic instead. I loved all the twists and turns and the dramatically vengeful Bombina.
3. Princess Sonora and the Long Sleep: I enjoyed Levine’s twist on Sleeping Beauty in how she gives Sonora such a curious, knowledgable personality and how she takes charge of her fate by pricking the spindle so she could avoid a marriage was a cool twist. Plus the inadverted love triangle was very funny.
4. Cinderellis and the Glass Hill: Cinderellis the inventor was such a sweet, adorkable protagonist who just wanted the friendship his older brothers shared. It instantly makes him rootable. Also it was nice of Levine to cleverly set up Cinderellis and Princess Marigold’s connection through disguise.
5. The Fairy’s Return: While this was a nice full circle with Ethelridge getting her groove back after her Diamonds and Toads disaster, and had plenty of references to the other stories, it felt less charming compared to the others. Probably just a personal opinion thing.
6. The Princess Test: While it was a cute retelling of the Princess and the Pea and I enjoyed the quriky characters, I heartily agreed with Trudy’s frustration with Rosella and her constant calamities. It made the story very humorous but leaves it last in the rankings.

I highly suggest parents or at least librarians stock this series for story time. It’s a very whimsical series and kids are sure to enjoy it.